Washington, D.C. - On March 8, over 30 people took to the streets of Washington, D.C. for an International Women's Day march.
The crowd gathered at Malcolm X Park to stand up for immigrant women, women affected by police violence and war, and for working women struggling for their rights around the world.
The rally was organized by DC Against the Trump Agenda, a coalition of organizations from across the DMV, and co-sponsored by Families Not Feds Coalition, and the newly launched Anti-War Committee DMV, and other groups in the DC area.
One of the emcees from the Freedom Road Socialist Organization DC, Kristen Bonner, kicked the rally off, stating to the crowd, "Whether it's in Venezuela, Cuba, Palestine, the Philippines, or Iran, women are under attack in these countries because the United States is there bombing them, destabilizing them, and trying to hold these countries back. To that we say shame," to which the crowd echoed "Shame!" in unity.
Bonner continued, "Without the labor of women, this country, or any country for that matter, would not function. We demand an end to violence in all forms against women, and full reproductive rights so we can determine our futures for ourselves!"
Several other speakers put forward the demands for working-class women, Black women, immigrant women, queer women and the LGBTQ community, and women affected by war and U.S. imperialism.
One of these speakers included the mother of Phillip Brown, a Black man who barely escaped being shot to death in his car when Homeland Security agents occupying DC shot into his vehicle. The shooting was covered up by Metropolitan Police Department officers, the chief of police, and the mayor. The U.S. Attorney's office declined to charge the HSI agents because "no one was hit by the bullets." His mother spoke on the ways that police violence particularly impacts women and families and reiterated the need for Black and brown women to stand together in the fight for justice.
Terra Martin, a member of the DC Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression, also spoke at the rally, saying "Across the country women, especially Black and brown mothers, are fighting battles many never see. We are fighting systems that judge us by our culture instead of our love. We fight systems that separate families instead of supporting them. Too often, mothers are punished for being poor."
Rally participants then marched through the park and onto the streets of DC, making their way down the crowded U Street Corridor in spite of police officers making the planned march route difficult to proceed. The route was specifically chosen to disrupt the city's plans to impose a youth curfew zone on the U Street Corridor, targeting Black youth.
Onlookers from nearby establishments and apartments cheered the group.
Several onlookers even joined the march, which concluded at the history Florida Avenue and 7th Street NW corner, where DC's anti-gentrification "Don't Mute DC" movement was born. There, as DC's "Go-Go" music played in the background, other community members joined in with their support during the closing speeches
A speaker for Anti-War Committee DMV concluded the event stating, "They oppress women here; they oppress women all over the world. But what they don't realize is that that is our greatest weapon - that commonality that we are all being oppressed by the same enemy, the U.S. war machine - and now we can all come together to fight that shared enemy."